Are you a lobster or an onion - or a bit of both?

I am a flea.

There is a metaphor for ya.

The onion metaphor is common in recovery; to quote the Big Book of Alcoholics anonymous, “more will be revealed.”

But the lobster one is appropriate too, for anyone who continues to work on themselves.

I’d have to say I am a bit of both. Throw in the ginger from my red-headed dad, I guess I make a Cantonese stir fry.

@zenvelo That’s quite an appealing metaphor if I may say!

Ah lahk turrdls

I’m like a wild horse. I’ve been broke but am not broken. Almost on one or 2 occasions now but have too much spirit and while I have come up lame a few times I’m a tough little pony.
I may not run as fast these days but fuck with me and I have still have plenty of buck and kick under my saddle. :-)

A lobster clawing my way through life.

@Pachy I’m having trouble picturing a lobstelephant!

LOTS of trunk meat.

Oy – the melted butter alone will clog my arteries!

I’d have to say both. I have definitely developed a hard casing and I’m very good at compartmentalising things from my past. However, those issues, my personality, my inner child etc. are all there. I’ve been engaging with my inner child and what she encountered, how she dealt with things and the person that she was (and is) quite a bit during 2016. As a coincidence, I was talking to my husband about how I believe that being the spirited, determined, stubborn little girl I was helped me survive things that happened later in my childhood. However, I feel I built that lobster shell around me during that period and it wasn’t until it ended that those still present traits emerged again. She didn’t go away, she just protected herself until it was safe to come out.

Interesting question my flippered friend. The lobster in me has resisted throwing ice in the pool in your honour today.

Interesting. I am seeing some of the vulnerability and anxiety from my childhood trauma and marital patterns coming out again as I face traveling this week. That is some of the onion layers.

@janbb, reckon I should have said I’m clawing my way through life for butter or worse.

The mind boggles.

How would the five year old Jan have managed such a trip?

I think I’m more an onion. I’m not sure. I’ve never heard these metaphors before.

I’ve been “old’ since I was young. In some ways I’m more adventurous and courageous than when I was young. I feel more free in many ways, stifled in others. I guess I do carry some hurt and baggage from my developmental years, but nothing extremely traumatic.

I’m a knot-hole. Big obvious blemish, growing hard outward around it.

I am a pentimento

As I get older, it becomes more obvious what my original design was.